According to Ira Glass, Christians Aren’t So Bad

During an interview in Ocotber 2012, Ira Glass, host of WBEZ Chicago’s This American Life, talks about his own observations of how Christians are depicted in the media. Glass noticed that Christians were often shown as crazy in their lifestyle, in a variety of ways. What surprised Glass most is that the Christians he knew in his life were nothing like the kind that you would find in the media. He found his Christian friends to be thoughtful, engaging, sincere, loving, and entirely willing to accept and befriend anyone. For Glass, that was worth noting.

When believers and non-believers interact with each other, real life happens. Glass adored the Christians he knew. How does that happen? It happens when genuine care and love are expressed, not the harsh, Bible-beating condemnation that often characterizes Christans in TV and news headlines.

When the sincerity of the Christian faith is measured by the media’s coverage, there will certainly be skeptics. Understanding that the media fails to accurately portray Christianity is not only beneficial for secular individuals to know, but also Christians, as well.

Rather than waiting for the media to get it right, I try to remind myself that what matters is real life, not the message of Christianity that’s on TV, no matter how believable it may be.